PS and DS 50/50?

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isisalaska
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Topic: PS and DS 50/50?
PostMon Jan 29, 2007 8:05 am

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In the real exam, is PS and DS about 50/50?, for instance if you are better in DS and not that good in PS can you still do well in the quant. section?
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aim-wsc
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PostMon Jan 29, 2007 12:15 pm

It will again depend on the no. of difficult questions you answer correctly.
not on whether it is PS or DS.

bytheway
i have one similar query:

what if you are better at only one types of questions say PS... then as difficulty level raises does GMAC ask more DS questions?

Any experts here?
Stacey?
Mark?
Ian?

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PostMon Jan 29, 2007 12:37 pm

aim-wsc
Are you answering questions at 1 am? Shocked

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PostMon Jan 29, 2007 1:04 pm

dont worry ma'am
I am not high or drunk Laughing

juss kiddning
yeah its 1.20 in India Wink

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PostTue Jan 30, 2007 10:38 am

i am not an expert but in the actual exam i did find tough PS questions too. I got one on combinations and one on probability. The probability question was really tough. Btw, i dont remember any tough DS questions. But for some DS questions i did take more than 2 minutes.

Did i answer your question?
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Stacey Koprince
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PostWed Jan 31, 2007 1:36 pm

There are exactly 15 DS questions and 22 PS questions in every 37-question quant section - so you have a few more PS. You will see difficult questions of both types - just depends what mix you get on the test.
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aim-wsc
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PostWed Jan 31, 2007 11:21 pm

Stacey Koprince wrote:
There are exactly 15 DS questions and 22 PS questions in every 37-question quant section - so you have a few more PS. You will see difficult questions of both types - just depends what mix you get on the test.
so that means this ratio never change significantly even if you are performing too well in one of the types?

I heard that proportion changes a bit for verbal section.. say if you are tackling CR well & SC poorly then it ll ask you more SC questions...

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Stacey Koprince
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PostWed Jan 31, 2007 11:54 pm

The # of math questions of each type never changes - 15 DS, 22 PS, always. The # of each of the 3 types of verbal questions does vary, but they haven't said how the algorithm determines how many of each to give. It's probably a combination of multiple factors, including experimentals and the natural constraints of RC (you have to give a certain number of questions in a clump) - but I have no idea whether individual performance is one of them. Only the people who make it know - and they don't release that info.
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aim-wsc
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PostThu Feb 01, 2007 7:11 am

thanks for the info

still i have a feeling that it depends on the individual performance///

sigh i ll know about that once i d take my real test Twisted Evil

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PostMon Feb 12, 2007 11:58 pm

hi aim-wsc,

I have not seen any indication so far that Pearson Vue gives different weight to DS or PS depending on if a student is strong on DS or PS. One thing I have noticed in GMATPrep is that the number of PS and DS is not fixed. To give you an example:

Test #1: PS: 20, DS: 17
Test #2: PS: 19, DS: 18

They tend to come in lumps in the GMATPrep.

I hope this is of some help.

Mark


aim-wsc wrote:
It will again depend on the no. of difficult questions you answer correctly.
not on whether it is PS or DS.

bytheway
i have one similar query:

what if you are better at only one types of questions say PS... then as difficulty level raises does GMAC ask more DS questions?

Any experts here?
Stacey?
Mark?
Ian?

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Mark Dabral
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Stacey Koprince
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PostThu Feb 15, 2007 12:35 pm

Just in - I just got the report from one of our instructors who took the test last month, and he did NOT have 22PS / 15DS. So they are starting to mess with the format - they just haven't made any formal announcement. I'll put a big notice on the main thread too.
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